


The Star-Spangled Ladies

by BuckyWithTheGoodHair86



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Awkward Steve Rogers, Big Sisters, Captain America: The First Avenger, Captain America: The First Avenger Compliant, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Gen, Male-Female Friendship, One Big Happy Family, Protective Siblings, Protective Steve, Star-Spangled Ladies, Star-Spangled Man With A Plan, USO girls - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 16:09:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21256070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BuckyWithTheGoodHair86/pseuds/BuckyWithTheGoodHair86
Summary: Family looks out for each other, whether you're blood, or whether you're a bunch of dancing girls and a super-soldier in spangly tights. And when some G.I.'s take issue with their Captain, the girls take issue right back. The Star-Spangled Man isn't the only one with a plan...





	The Star-Spangled Ladies

**Author's Note:**

> I commented on Tumblr that the ladies of the Star-Spangled Show must have loved awkward baby Steve to death-though, of course, they would boss him around and tease him and treat him like the thirty big sisters he never had. Then my muse was like, "No, no, we should do something with this!" So, this is what I did.
> 
> Take it away, ladies! It's showtime!

* * *

"Thirty minutes to curtain, ladies!"

"Did ya hear that, Laverne? Thirty minutes. Gimme the curling iron," Tallulah said, holding out a hand.

"Keep your shirt on," Laverne huffed, snapping her gum. "We're almost done." She turned her head to the side, getting a better angle for her mascara as Steve's hands moved with her head.

"Hey, careful," Steve said. "Warn me before you do that! I don't want to burn your head again."

"Aw, it's okay, sugar," Laverne said, smiling at him in the mirror. "I burned my own head so many times doing that, I can hardly feel anything up there anyway. But you're sweet for worrying."

Steve blushed like he did any time someone complimented him and returned his focus to Laverne's hair. She finished with her mascara and picked up a tissue to spit her gum out, putting the final touches on her lipstick as Steve finished her last curl.

"Beautiful," Laverne said, standing up and patting a gentle hand to the side of her curls. "Steve, you are a doll." He had a good hand and a good eye for hair and make-up—probably something to do with him being an artist. He'd been lousy at first, but Mary-Therese had decided after their first couple of shows that he could make himself more useful than just carrying things for them, and had decided to teach him how to do makeup. She hadn't given him a choice in the matter, and he caught on pretty quick, so Rose decided to teach him how to do hair next. He was in high demand backstage now, and the girls all loved their turn to get all done up by Steve.

Laverne gave her hair another pat, then kissed Steve on the cheek, lightly, so as not to smear her lipstick, and his face went as red as the flag stripes on her skirt. "Tallulah, your turn!" she called as she chuckled and stepped away.

"You want help with your hair, Tallulah?" Steve offered.

"I got it, sweetheart" she replied, picking up the curling iron. "Besides, I think Shirley is having a makeup crisis."

"Would you mind, Stevie?" Shirley asked, holding out her makeup bag. "Ever since I sprained my wrist, I've been having trouble not stabbing myself in the eyeball with my eyeliner pencil."

Tallulah reached over and smacked Shirley on the shoulder with a hairbrush. "Don't call him Stevie, you know he doesn't like that."

"Sorry," Shirley apologized. "But would you help me?"

"Sure," Steve said with a smile. Shirley sat down on top of a trunk and Steve started carefully applying her makeup.

"Doreen, did you take my shoes?" Eliza called across the room.

"We got the same size feet; I don't see why it matters," Doreen replied.

"Cause I got mine worn in the way I like 'em," Eliza said. "Here, take these back."

"I can't find my skirt!" Angie called from behind a screen. "I'm comin' out! Steve, keep your eyes to yourself!"

Shirley giggled at the color Steve's face turned as he zeroed his attention in on her eyelashes. He blushed so easy, and the girls had a lot of fun teasing him.

"Hey, Shirl," Loretta said, dropping down to sit beside her. "Listen, trade spots with me in the line-up, will ya?"

"What for?" Shirley asked.

Loretta sighed. "Because I'm right by the curtain, and I'm tired of Frank grabbing my tush before he comes out to do his Hitler bit."

Steve coughed and dropped the mascara brush and bent down to pick it up.

"So you want me to get mine grabbed instead? No, thanks," Shirley said.

"Oh, come on," Loretta pleaded. "He doesn't like redheads; he probably won't go for yours anyway."

Shirley snorted. "Backstage in Baltimore would beg to differ. Just slap his hand or something."

"Yeah, I tried that already," Loretta sighed. "Fine. I'll go see if June will swap with me."

She got up and left and Steve finished dusting off the mascara brush. "I didn't know Frank did that," he said softly, finishing up with Shirley's left eye.

Shirley sighed. "Yeah, well, whatcha gonna do?" she asked with a philosophical shrug.

"It's not okay for him to treat you like that," Steve replied, bristling a little. "I'll talk to him."

Shirley smiled fondly and reached over to pat his cheek. "Aw, Steve, you're sweet. But it's showbiz, honey. Plenty of hands besides Frank's out there."

"I'll talk to Frank," Steve said again. "And if anyone else does that, you'll let me know, right?"

"Sure," Shirley said, and she didn't see what Steve could do, but she appreciated the gesture.

"Ain't he the sweetest?" Dolores said, leaning over Shirley's shoulder as Steve left to find his shield.

"I could just eat him with a spoon," Shirley agreed. They all teased him and bossed him around like he was their kid brother, but there wasn't one of them that didn't just adore him. He was a good kid. "It was nice of him to offer, but I hope he doesn't tangle with Frank. Steve's like a little puppy, and Frank's got an awful sharp bite."

"Speaking of," Rose said, stepping out from behind a screen and straightening her skirt. "Did you hear about what happened at lunch?"

"No," Dolores said, leaning in eagerly. "What happened?"

Rose gave her a _look_. "No, it's not any good gossip. Listen, you know how Steve always sits on his own in the canteen?"

"Yeah," Shirley said sadly. Steve was quiet and kind of shy and kept to himself a lot anyway, but once they'd started performing at the military bases, that seemed to be a little more pronounced. None of the G.I.'s seemed too keen on Steve, and it ruffled a lot of the girls' feathers. Sure, he was an awkward little dork, but he was _their_ awkward little dork.

"So, Marge was telling me that Tallulah told her that Irene was sitting close enough to see the whole thing happen," Rose said. "And Irene said that Steve was sittin' there, eating lunch and minding his own business, and a group of G.I.'s came by on their way to their own table and stopped next to him and started ragging on him. They were sayin' stuff about how if he was a real man, he'd be out on the front lines, and how he must be some kind of sissy staying back and dancing with a bunch of girls."

Dolores scowled, and Shirley felt a frown creasing her own face. For all they felt like a little family by now, they all knew Steve wasn't happy with this job. He wanted to be out on the front lines, not because jerks like that had gotten in his head, but because he wanted to serve his country. He'd wanted to do that since he was that little guy he used to be, but the brass wouldn't let him out there, since he was some kind of special 'science experiment'. It was a shame, really. The girls all loved having him around, but it did feel like a waste of his talents.

"And then," Rose went on, taking a quick look around and lowering her voice. "One of 'em—that big muscly Gene Kelly-lookin' Lieutenant that's been sweet on Mary-Therese since we got here? I guess she musta mentioned that Steve helped her with her makeup or something, but anyhow, he starts _insinuating_ that between doing hair and makeup and the dancing and the tights, that maybe Steve _weren't_ no real man, but he was…you know…" Rose was getting a little red now.

"What?" Dolores asked, but Shirley's eyebrows were rising, guessing where this was going.

"That he was maybe into musical theater," Rose finished.

Shirley gasped. "He said that? To Steve's face?"

"Uh huh," Rose confirmed. "But in _much_ less polite language than that."

"I don't get it," Dolores complained. "I mean, he's in a song and dance show; he _is_ in musical theater."

"No, honey," Shirley said. Dolores was still pretty fresh out from the corn fields of Kansas, and she was a hell of a dancer, but she had a lot to learn about show business. "Rose means he was saying Steve is playin' for the other team. That he's the kind of guy who's not interested in girls," she clarified when Dolores continued to look confused.

Dolores gasped, the lights finally clicking on.

"Exactly," Rose said. "Then, Irene said Steve was gettin' all red and everything, but he didn't say nothin', and finally just picked up his tray to go. Then one of Lieutenant's buddies 'accidentally' bumps into him while he's gettin' up and knocks Steve's lunch all over his shirt. Then Lieutenant says maybe now Steve'll have to change out of a man's clothes and get back into one of the dresses he belongs in."

Dolores growled. "You show me which one he is during the show, and afterwards I'll find him and hog-tie him to a balcony! He can't talk to Steve like that!"

"Dottie, he's built like a linebacker," Rose said. "You're not hog-tying him to anything."

"If I can do it to a thousand-pound Red Angus bull, I can do it to a Lieutenant," Dolores said coolly. "Just let me at him."

"She could do it," Shirley agreed. "And if you got Tallulah in on it, she's got a great right hook. But look, I got a better idea."

They spent a couple of minutes conspiring before curtain call, then they rushed over to the stage. The music came up and the girls danced out, singing loudly to be heard over the cheers of the men in the audience. Normally, Shirley would have been basking in the attention of four hundred gorgeous men, but her smile was painted on tonight. Just who did those dirtbags think they were, treating Steve Rogers like that? The girls knew enough of his story by now to know about the sickly little shrimp he'd been before, and his confidence just hadn't caught up to his height yet was all. He was too decent of a guy to turn into a jerk once it did happen, but the poor thing was still finding his feet and needed looking after until he got them under him. Maybe all men should go through something like Steve did. Because unlike a lot of guys who were used to being tall, strong and handsome, Steve didn't act like anybody owed him anything. He was a total sweetheart.

Steve came out and did his bit, and Shirley's fake smile turned into a proud one. He was getting so much better at his lines. Eliza and Angie had sat him down and had a good coaching session after that first show where he'd been reading off a card taped to his shield.

Shirley heard an irritated, muffled squeak from the corner of the stage, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Loretta glaring daggers at Frank as he slid onto the stage in full Hitler regalia. Steve must have heard it too, because he frowned before turning back to the front of the stage with a smile to act like he didn't see Frank coming.

Frank got right up behind Steve, and they had a pretty good fake punching routine down, but Shirley could hear that one connecting over the sound of the music. Frank went down a lot less gracefully than he usually did, and he stayed pretty still once he got there.

The audience cheered, the fanfare played, and the curtain dropped. "What the hell, Rogers?" Raymond the stage manager hissed. "You're not actually supposed to hit him."

"Must've aimed wrong. Sorry," Steve replied with a shrug, not sounding sorry at all.

Raymond rolled his eyes and set to trying to get Frank up. None of the girls seemed inclined to help. Loretta hurried over, her heels clicking across the stage. "Aw, Steve, honey, did you do that for me?"

Steve blushed, but he looked just a little bit proud of himself. "I mean, I heard what you said backstage, and I talked to him before we came out, 'cause he shouldn't treat you like that. I guess he didn't listen."

"Aw, Steve!" she gushed and she flung her arms around him.

Steve went red as a beet and stiff as a post, his arms pinned to his sides, and after a couple seconds of that, Marge walked over laughing. "Let him breathe, Loretta," she chuckled.

Loretta let him go, still grinning broadly, and the girls traipsed off the stage, smiling at Steve or giving him a pat on the shoulder. Loretta wasn't the only one Frank got handsy with.

It was the last show of the night, so they all hurried back to the dressing room. Most of the girls were in a hurry to meet up with what June called their B.O.B.'s—Beau Of the Base. They were heading out tomorrow morning to fly down to hit the Florida bases, so tonight was their last night with the fellas here.

"Hey, Shirl, Dottie said you wanted to talk to me?" Mary-Therese said, pulling her shirt over her head and tossing it into her trunk. "Will it take long? I'm supposed to meet Jerry."

"Yeah," Shirley replied, shimmying out of her skirt. "Listen, did you hear what he said about Steve today…?"

Mary-Therese's eyebrows had disappeared into her hair by the time Shirley was done, her hands paused halfway through buttoning up her blouse. "Oh, hell, no," she fumed. "You count me in. And you know who we should get in on this? Vicki." They were all in showbiz, and they all knew they were a group of good-looking ladies, but they all agreed none of them was as good-looking as Vicki Marlowe.

"Ooh, that's a good idea," Shirley agreed. "If I go get her—"

Mary-Therese waved her in the direction of the bathroom. "I got this crowd. Ain't nobody leaving 'til we fix this." Shirley pulled the belt on her pants and started walking to where Vicki was coming out of the bathroom. Behind her she heard Mary-Therese yelling, "Listen up, ladies! No dates tonight!" The chorus of complaints was quickly drowned out by a sharp whistle. "Shut up and listen!"

Shirley smiled. Mary-Therese was the oldest of twelve kids—she could command a crowd.

By the time Shirley was back with Vicki, the rest of the Star-Spangled Ladies were on board. "Well, sure," Angie said as they left the dressing room. "After all Steve's done for us—even if he hadn't decked Frank tonight. You remember how in Chicago, that creep kept trying to feel me up at the diner, and Steve stepped right in and got him to back off, and then walked me back to the hotel?"

"He did the same for me in Buffalo," Eliza said. "That boy is a gentleman, which is something these clowns wouldn't recognize if it bit 'em in the leg."

"Some of them _do_ look good in uniform," Laverne conceded. "But an ape is still an ape no matter how nice you dress him up."

"I couldn't ever stand jerks like them," Doreen scowled. "Why a man thinks being all tough and nasty makes him attractive is beyond me."

"Beyond all of us," Irene said. "I mean, you can have your fun with 'em, sure, but no girl wants to end up with a guy like that."

"You gonna punch one of 'em, Tallulah?" Loretta asked.

"Hell, yes," Tallulah agreed, her curls bouncing as she nodded her head. "Steve may be too much of a gentleman to do it himself, but somebody oughtta."

There was a series of emphatic agreements.

"Don't see your rope for hog-tyin', Dottie," Rose teased.

Dolores smirked and straightened her scarf. "A girl's got to work with what she's got, Rosie. You just worry about your part and I'll worry about mine."

They stepped back into the main auditorium where a crowd of admirers was waiting. Steve was there too, back in his civilian clothes. Shirley always kind of figured he'd much rather go back to his room and read after the show, but he always hung around, and he always ended up in whatever bar or diner the party moved to—just one of the ways he watched out for the girls.

"Oh, good, Steve, you're here," Shirley said, sweeping over to him with Loretta and June. "We've got some suitcases and stuff all packed up, but the truck's way over on the other side of the parking lot. June rolled her ankle during that last jump, and between that and my wrist…"

"Oh, sure, no, I can help you," Steve said quickly. "Show me where it is." He usually carried their stuff for them anyway, but closer to time to go. But if these guys thought someone needed to be big and tough to be a man, well, it seemed as good a time as any to prove Steve's muscles weren't all for show.

Loretta directed him to a pile of luggage backstage, and Shirley watched with a pleased smile as several jaws dropped in the crowd when Steve came out loaded down with trunks and suitcases and not even breaking a sweat.

"Mm!" June said once Steve was out of earshot, but loud enough to be heard by most of the group. "Now that's what I call a man."

"He could pick me up with those muscles any day," Shirley swooned, just a little too loud. All around the room, each of the girls directed their eyes away from their B.O.B.'s and cast significant glances at Steve's retreating muscular form.

"Bet you couldn't carry that many, Davey," Irene teased, tapping a finger to her B.O.B.'s nose.

Several of the girls giggled, and several of the men bristled and huffed, and it was an awful lot of fun watching them scramble over each other to haul the rest of the equipment out to the truck.

"It almost feels mean for you to have parked it that far away," Shirley said with a grin.

Angie grinned right back. "A little sweat never hurt anybody," she chuckled. "Though it sure is gonna mess up Leroy's hair." They laughed.

Once the luggage had been stowed and the G.I.'s had caught their breath, the party headed to the bar for drinks and dancing. Shirley, Loretta and June ignored the rest of the men and sat with Steve in his usual corner table, somewhat to his surprise. Poor guy looked kind of glad to have company, though, and Shirley made a note of that for the next base—there would always be a couple of them who could keep Steve company.

To keep Steve from blushing, they kept the conversation nice and clean, asking Steve all kinds of questions about growing up and sharing stories of their own. Irene came and joined them after getting a drink with hardly a backwards glance at a scowling Davey.

Just like in a movie, the bar seemed to get abruptly silent for just a second when the door opened and Vicki walked in. She'd hung back behind the rest of them, taking the time to slip into something that hugged all her curves in just the right ways. Every male eye in the bar was on her, and she lingered just inside the door, suddenly surrounded by a crowd of adoring smiles and offers of drinks and dances. She evaluated the crowd around her with an almost theatrical boredom, dismissing each suitor in turn before face lit up as her eyes finally landed on Steve. The crowd parted like the Red Sea with puzzled stares and deflated confusion as she swept forward.

"Hi, Vicki," Steve said when she sat down next to him. "You didn't want to dance tonight?"

"I'm all danced out for now," she said. She smiled and gestured down at her ankle. "Twisted it funny during the show."

Steve frowned sympathetically. "There seems to be a lot of that going around," he said, looking at June.

June chuckled. "You try dancing in heels some time," she said, and Steve did blush a little at that, but he laughed.

"You want me to get you some ice?" Steve asked. He'd offered the same to June once they sat down, but she'd politely declined.

"Oh, I think it's okay," Vicki said. "It would be nice if I had somewhere to put it up, but I can do that back in my room."

"Oh, no, you can put it up if you need to," Steve assured her. "Here," he said, scooting back from the table and patting his knees. "I don't mind."

"Aw, thank you, sweetie," Vicki said, shifting a little to bring her perfectly uninjured ankle up to rest across his knees.

Irene dissolved into a fit of giggles that she masked with a cough, and Shirley had to bite down a smile of her own. The room was filled with the jealous eyes of men who would have _loved_ to have Vicki's gorgeous legs in their lap—never mind that Steve had folded his hands in a perfectly gentlemanly fashion on the table in front of him and was not taking advantage of the proximity in the slightest.

Over the course of the evening, more of the girls drifted away from their dates and over to Steve's table with nothing but a sharp look or comment directed behind them as they went. Finally all that was left was Mary-Therese, still hanging on Jerry, and at a nod from her, the rest of the girls declared their intentions to head to bed, and Steve got up to walk them back to the hotel. He offered one arm to June and one to Vicki, and the party departed.

Shirley hung toward the back of the group, as did Tallulah and Dolores. Mary-Therese was flirting up a storm with Jerry, making some suggestions it was good Steve wasn't around to hear.

"So, what say you and me find some place to be alone?" Jerry asked her.

"All alone?" Mary-Therese said, with just a little bit of a pout. She nodded in Tallulah and Dolores's direction. "My friends were tellin' me how they hoped they could come too."

The way Jerry's eyes boggled right out of his head had Shirley snorting into her coat as she pulled it on. Fortunately, Jerry's mind was entirely too focused elsewhere to notice.

"Sounds good to me," he said, like he could hardly believe his luck.

Shirley nudged Dolores with her elbow. "Have fun," she whispered before she slipped out the door.

She caught up with Steve and the rest of the girls, and he saw them all to the doors of their rooms and told them goodnight. Shirley knew all of them, like her and Angie, were peeking out their curtains until he disappeared into his own room across the parking lot. Then, with much whispering and giggling, they snuck out and along the porch to gather in Mary-Therese and Eliza's room.

They laughed about their evening while they waited for their three friends to come back. The front door finally opened and Mary-Therese appeared, mascara smudging around her eyes as she cried, she was laughing so hard. "Oh, he fell for it!" she wheezed, collapsing onto her bed. "Hook, line and sinker!"

"You should've seen Tallulah!" Dolores laughed. "All hands and, 'oh, what _big_ arms you've got under that shirt, soldier!'"

"I have never seen a man get undressed that fast," Tallulah grinned. "I thought he was gonna fall over, yankin' those pants down!"

"And did it work?" Angie asked eagerly.

"Oh, yeah," Mary-Therese said. She smacked Dolores in the arm with a grin. "Dottie here is a hell of a cowgirl! One second, we had him all pressed up against the wall and he's thinkin' he's gonna get lucky. Eight seconds later, his hands and his ankles are tied to the balcony railing of the second floor of the Officer's Mess!"

The story was interrupted for a round of hoots, cackles and applause.

"Imagine the look on General Johnson's face when he walks in for breakfast tomorrow and sees that!" Loretta crowed. "Lieutenant Jerry Whittaker, tied to the porch with Dottie's pink scarf!"

"Did you leave him his shorts at least?" Eliza asked.

"We did," Tallulah said. She grinned. "If you count stretching the waist band around the porch light leavin' 'em!"

"We didn't wanna leave him _totally_ naked, though," Dolores said. "I mean, it's a public place; there's gonna be people out there." She smirked. "So we left him one of the Star-Spangled skirts to cover himself up with."

There was another chorus of delighted laughter.

" 'Course, the best part was his face at the end," Mary-Therese said. "When we told him that if he was gonna treat people like garbage, what goes around was gonna hafta come around and he was gettin' off easy. Then Tallulah socked him in the jaw and told him he wasn't ever gonna be half the man Steve Rogers was."

They continued pressing the three of them for details well into the night. The next morning, the canteen was abuzz with the news. Jerry, of course, was in disgrace, and nowhere to be seen. Even though he'd been careful not to admit to being played for a fool and tied up by a bunch of girls, the truth of the story seemed to have gotten out somehow.

"Don't know _how_ that happened," Vicki said with an innocent shrug, sipping coolly at her coffee.

From then on, every base they went to, there was always a Star-Spangled lady or two hanging adoringly around Steve whenever the G.I.'s started getting snarky. Nobody got tied to any more balconies, but Tallulah socked a couple more jaws, and Laverne stuck to her story that, honestly, that Corporal just _fell_ off the stage. It picked up a little more once they headed overseas, but it was nothing the girls of the Star-Spangled Show couldn't handle.

Steve, bless his little heart, remained oblivious to most of it. Well, he acted like he did anyway, but sometimes Shirley wondered. He still looked out for them the way he always did, carrying their stuff, doing their hair and makeup and scaring off unwelcome advances. They still bossed him around and teased him like they always did, giving him little kisses on the cheek or ruffling his hair, hanging their clean lingerie out to dry where he would walk by it, or talking about their dates. He still put up with it good-naturedly, but there was something about the way he smiled at them when one of them would sit down with him in the canteen, or when they would blow off a date to chat with him in the corner of a bar, and Shirley wondered if maybe he didn't know what they were doing after all.

It was a real rough show when they got out to Italy—even before Steve got booed off the stage, they'd all felt the tension hanging over the camp. What happened in that show had never happened before, though, and they weren't quite sure what to do about it.

"Has anyone seen Steve?" Marge asked.

"He's outside," Angie said, nodding at the door of the tent. "He didn't wanna come in."

"Out in the rain?" Dolores asked, worried.

Shirley moved to the door of their tent and pulled the flap back enough to look out. She could see Steve sitting off to the side of the stage, wrapped up in his jacket and sketching something forlornly in his little notebook. She sighed, aching to run out there and give him a hug.

A woman appeared on the side stage next to Steve, dressed in a military uniform, and Shirley felt a spark of recognition. "Dottie," she said, smacking Dolores's arm. She nodded out at the woman. "Isn't that the girl Steve keeps sketching all those pictures of?"

Dolores peered through the rain. "Yeah." They watched the two of them for a minute. "I asked about her one time. He went red as a strawberry and snapped the book shut, but he said her name was Peggy."

The two of them hurried off into the rain, and Shirley and Dolores turned back inside. Dolores smirked. "Not interested in girls. Right."

Shirley smiled back in agreement. The way Steve's face had lit up when Peggy sat down next to him had been visible clear across that foggy courtyard. Whoever this Peggy girl was, Steve had it bad. She was probably alright. Had to be, for Steve to be sweet on her like that.

The next show ended up being cancelled because no one could find Steve. Sure, the girls could sing and dance around a little, but the show kind of revolved around him. When he wasn't back by nightfall, they were all really worried, and as he continued in his absence the next day, they started to fear the worst. This was a war zone, after all. They weren't right up on the front or anything, but there had to be some Nazis around. Had something happened to him?

Just before sunset that evening, a cheer came up from the other end of camp. Whatever it was, the whole camp was out to see it, and it took the girls a while to push their way through. Steve was back, with four hundred other guys besides. He'd stolen a plane, busted into a Nazi weapons factory with his prop shield, a hand gun and Eliza's helmet, and rescued four hundred people the Army couldn't get at.

"Did you really do all that?" Loretta asked in awe, when Steve came by later to apologize for running off on them.

"We always knew you had it in you," Angie said proudly, kissing him on the cheek.

"Guess this means you're leavin' the show, huh?" Vicki asked. "Big hero stuff to do and all."

"I didn't mean to leave you guys in the lurch like this," Steve apologized.

"Oh, hush," Dolores said, throwing her arms around him. "It's about time we learned some new songs anyway."

He was still blushing from all the hugs and attention, but he chuckled at that.

"We're gonna miss you, sweetheart," Tallulah said, giving him a hug.

"I, uh, I'm gonna miss you guys too," he said. "Thanks for, well, for everything."

"Thank _you_," Shirley said, giving him a hug of her own. He was still blushing, but there was something in the way he was holding himself now, something in his eyes that told her he'd finally found his feet. He knew what he was doing now, and what a way he'd picked to announce it to the world! She patted him on the cheek before pulling away. Their little Steve was all grown up.

"We'll be alright," she assured him. "And we'll see you around." She smiled proudly. "Now get out there and save the world."

* * *


End file.
